After his Kenyan mission, he is set to depart for Madagascar on November 7, where he is expected to continue the promotion of the Children’s Rosary movement for the remainder of the month.
Asher has also been invited to the Catholic Archdiocese of Johannesburg in South Africa to help with the launch of the Children's Rosary in that Metropolitan See.
He also plans to visit Cameroon around December 11 through January 1.
The American teen speaks French, Spanish and is conversational in Portuguese. When in a French speaking country, he wears his French Children's Rosary t-shirt and distributes the French Children's Rosary book.
Before his African trip, Asher was in France, where he volunteered at a Marian shrine. His apostolate at the La Salette Shrine in the Alps was to work at an information desk helping pilgrims during their stay, and giving informational sessions on the Holy Rosary.
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He told ACI Africa that his most memorable experience in Africa is the big numbers of children gathering to pray in the Children’s Rosary groups.
A Children's Rosary group in Tanzania. Credit: Children's Rosary
“In the U.S., we have wonderful groups. But they are smaller. In Uganda, we would have groups of 70 children or more praying together. I felt that that was very powerful. Seeing the children kneeling there. Oftentimes, I would just kneel right down. I was very moved by that,” he recalled, and added, “The groups are very, very large, which is a huge blessing.”
The other difference Asher saw from the Church life he is used to in the U.S. is the Parish structure. “I noticed that you have a central church, and then many, many outposts or sub-parishes connected to the parish. In the United States, I'm familiar with a parish generally comprising one, two or three churches, but no more than that, generally speaking. Sometimes there are exceptions, but generally it's one or two or three churches,” Asher said.
He also noticed the large number of non-Catholics enrolled in Catholic schools in Africa. This, he said, is a blessing and an opportunity for the Church to get more converts.
“Anywhere in our Children’s Rosary groups in the world we would be open to non-Catholic children who pray the rosary. But on a practical level, we've noticed that there are often in Catholic schools here, a lot of students enrolled who are not Catholic and who are interested in participating in the church. In the United States, church-based groups are mostly Catholic,” he said.
Asher’s mother, Dr. Blythe Marie Kaufman, founded the international Children’s Rosary on 10 April 2011 in West Hartford, Connecticut USA.
The goal of the Children's Rosary is to support the prayer lives of the children and to help them grow in holiness through prayer of the Holy Rosary in prayer groups. Groups can form in parishes, schools and orphanages among other institutions.
“The movement began tiny with just a handful of children,” Dr. Blythe tells ACI Africa, and explains that the reason was to gather children to pray for their parish’s finances that were dwindling.
“The inspiration came that maybe we should bring the children together as the prayers of children are so strong,” she said, and added, “We found out after the meeting that the collection that weekend had been the highest for the remainder of the year, second only to Easter and Christmas. Yet no one knew the children were meeting to pray for the finances of the parish. It was a beautiful signal of the power of the prayers of children.”
Dr. Kaufman sought the permission of parents at the parish to form a children’s Rosary group, and they agreed.
In 2012, a second group formed followed by many others internationally, including one in Kenya.
In 2019, Dr. Kaufman and her family visited Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, and documented their experiences. Asher was only 12 on this maiden trip.
The Vatican Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life is promoting the Children's Rosary with Local Ordinaries that visit the Rome-based department.
Today, there are Children's Rosary groups in 45 countries. “While we have participation from many African countries we would love to see more,” Dr. Kaufman says.
The National Catholic Register (NCRegister), ACI Africa’s news partner, has reported on the Children's Rosary in Nigeria and how the Children's Rosary was cultivating leaders in the faith.
“We are seeing tremendous fruits from the groups worldwide,” Dr. Kaufman tells ACI Africa, making reference to the testimony of Fr. Wilson Wachira of Kenya who spoke of the number of broken families in his parish and through the Children's Rosary that families were coming back together. “He described the Children's Rosary as spreading like a bush fire in his parish,” Dr. Kaufman says.
In the October 17 interview with ACI Africa, Asher said he finds travelling to Africa, alone for the first time, significant in his discernment for the Priesthood.
He said that following God’s will is “something that when you're home and with your family and everything is sort of stable around you… sometimes hard.”
“Now I'm going off on my own…And I'm going to places, where I've never been before; to many people I've never met before,” the U.S.-born teenager said.
He narrated an incident he had encountered in Tanzania that he surrendered entirely to divine providence.
“I remember recently in Tanzania I was traveling to Moshi from Dar es Salaam. I got on the bus, and I thought to myself, I don't even know where I'm going to be staying tonight. There is a Priest who will be hosting me, but he hasn't written back. And I'm just taking a leap of faith,” Asher recalled.
Asher Kaufman with schoolchildren in Rwanda. Credit: Children's Rosary
He continued, “I had faith in God that things were going to work out. And they did work out in a way that I couldn't have predicted because we ended up meeting another Priest who helped us get all the way to Moshi. It was definitely a sign from the Lord that when we follow him in positions in which we aren't completely in control, we accept that and we go there anyway.”
“I think travelling this way is good for me as I discover my mission in life, my mission as a priest. And engage in the Lord's work as the Lord wants me to,” he said.
Asher also shared with ACI Africa why he wants to be a Catholic Priest.
“For me, it was something that started when I was 11. And it was surprisingly concrete,” he said, and added, “I had this feeling in prayer that the Lord was calling me to be a Priest. And that was something that I hadn't really thought of in such a way before.”
The idea of becoming a Priest, Asher recalled, “had been there, but I hadn't thought it was for me. Then as time went on, I continued to pray about it. And it never really went away. It only became more concrete.”
The American teen who has an older brother and an older sister, all grown and living away from home, told ACI Africa that his mother, Dr. Kaufman, has mentored him the most in faith.
“There are other people, other Priests in my life, family members in my life, who have been helpful for me along the way. My dad, as well, has been supportive of me. But I have to say, most particularly it has been my mother encouraging me to pray the Rosary, to be virtuous, and helping me to discern the Lord's will at times,” he said during the October 17 interview.
Agnes Aineah is a Kenyan journalist with a background in digital and newspaper reporting. She holds a Master of Arts in Digital Journalism from the Aga Khan University, Graduate School of Media and Communications and a Bachelor's Degree in Linguistics, Media and Communications from Kenya's Moi University. Agnes currently serves as a journalist for ACI Africa.
Asher Kaufman poses for a photo with a Children's Rosary group in Uganda. Credit: Children's Rosary
Asher Kaufman in Gulu, Uganda. Credit: Children's Rosary
